Morning Brief — July 31 2013

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The opposition New Democrats say the Harper government isn’t doing enough to protest Russia’s recent anti-gay laws, though it stops short of joining with activists calling to boycott the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi. “I don’t think [Foreign Affairs Minister John] Baird has been strong enough in his concern or been declarative enough of the government’s position against the laws that have recently been passed in Russia,” said Paul Dewar, the NDP’s foreign affairs critic.

Queen’s Park stuck its thumb in the eye of the Harper government by announcing it will provide the funds necessary — about $2 million a year — to keep the Experimental Lakes Area open. The federal Conservatives had sought to close the research station in what critics charge was a political decision to reduce the amount of environmental research being done.

An interesting battle over a bitumen upgrader is brewing in Alberta. A seemingly minor change in the municipal boundaries of Fort McMurray cost a Calgary oil producer more than half of its reserves, throwing into question a massive upgrader it was in the process of building. The upgrader then allows the oil products to be transported by pipelines.

Just two days before five critical by-elections in Ontario, the Speaker of the Ontario legislature set out to defuse a potentially explosive story that former premier Dalton McGuinty’s henchmen tried to pressure him into not charging former energy minister Chris Bentley with contempt for not releasing all documents on two cancelled gas plants. Dave Levac said he never felt political interference that would prevent him from making decisions, despite opposition charges that the Liberal government tried to bully him into changing a key ruling.

A newly emboldened Barack Obama laid out what is being called his “grand bargain” with the business community — lower taxes in return for more middle-class jobs. Chances are, he won’t get either, but it’s opening up an interesting debate that will have potentially huge ramifications for congressional candidates in 2014 and in the nomination races leading up to the 2016 presidential election.

Still in Washington, the US central bank is expected to keep its bond-buying program going, but will also try to quash rumours that interest-rate rises are imminent. Recent Fed announcements have confused investors, economists, businesses, and even robots. Why is the Fed still injecting liquidity into the economy? Because, while the U.S. economy is certainly showing some promise, job growth will dip in the next few months before accelerating into next year, according to a survey of economists.

The same cannot be said of China’s ailing stock market, which is second only to Greece in rotten results over the past four years. Shanghai Composite Index (SHCOMP) has lost more money for investors than any other in the world, falling 43 per cent from its high and losing some $748 billion in market value for its investors.

More happy news? OK, how about this: German retail sales unexpectedly declined in June, suggesting that doubts about Europe’s economic recovery weighed on consumer spending.

Federal Agriculture Minister Gerry Ritz and MP Ted Menzies mark first year of wheat and barley checkoffs in Claresholm, Alberta.

Nova Scotia will release its audited financial statements for the 2012-13 fiscal year.

In Featured Opinion this morning:

iPolitics’ Don Lenihan asks whether Jason Kenney can perform the same feats of outreach he managed as minister for citizenship and immigration in his new post as Minister for Jobs. First, he’ll have to do some fence mending with the provinces on the Canada Job Grant.

Liberal M.P. Kirsty Duncan decries the lack of attention to diversity in Canada’s health care system that has left those suffering from sickle cell disease and thalassemia facing ignorance and inadequate care.

Ned Parker, the L.A.Times former Baghdad bureau chief, reports for Foreign Policy from a divided Egypt that the increasingly violent stand-off between the military and the Muslim Brotherhood could lead to all-out civil war. Islamists have vowed to stay in the streets until the last drop of their blood is shed, while the military also shows no signs of backing down.

Bloomberg’s William Pesek warns that China shows too many symptoms of the skyscraper curse that has struck other economies on the brink of a crash in the past. On July 20, the Broad Group broke ground on Sky City on the outskirts of the south-central city of Changsha. The skyscraper will rise 838 metres (2,749 feet) into the heavens to become the world’s tallest building.

Art Mantell, who began the Low Down to Hull and Back News in 1973, died Sunday in hospital in Wakefield, Que. The newspaper was known as a cheeky alternative to the stilted mainstream, and, though small, was a strong defender of Anglo rights in Western Quebec. Mantell had been ill, on and off, for the past year.

And, finally, while the inmates at Guantanamo Bay are eschewing food, they apparently have developed a taste for smutty novels, especially Fifty Shades of Grey. “Rather than the Koran, the book that is requested most by the (166 detainees in Camp 7) is ‘Fifty Shades of Grey.’ They’ve read the entire series,” said Representative Jim Moran of Virginia, who was among congressional delegates who toured the top-security facility last week.